LA BODEGA — Restaurant in Easton

For the restaurant just opening, it was ok. The margaritas and the mojito were amazing! For the price of the food and what you get, it seems pretty expensive and you don’t get a lot. It was strange getting a sharing platter and the whole dinner was pretty much French fries and barely any meat, very weird since this is a Mexican restaurant. If I wanted fries, I would’ve walked across the street to Rude Burger.

We went for dinner and had a 5pm reservation. We felt rushed by our server the entire time to hurry up and leave. It definitely seems like a place where they don’t want you to linger and have a couple drinks with dinner at a table. We were constantly asked if we were finished and kept telling the servers we weren’t. We still had food and drinks at our table and they wanted us to pay. After the fourth or fifth time of them asking, we could tell they wanted us gone and wanted the turn over. We were at our table for barely an hour for dinner. I’d give dinner one more try but definitely want to try their lunch menu. If you want to linger, enjoy your dinner and drinks, and not feel rushed…I’d sit at the bar because the servers really want to have as many tables as possible and will...

We visited here for dinner Saturday night and we noticed a few issues; 1) The open kitchen seems to prevent the restaurant from being able to be cooled to a comfortable level. 2) We ordered appetizers and after they came out I ordered the ceviche for my dinner (it’s under the entree portion) and my husband the tacos. The ceviche was brought out but not the tacos. After 15 or so minutes we asked about my husband’s dinner and why the ceviche was brought out so early and she said it was because it was an appetizer. We already had appetizers and THEN ordered our meals so that didn’t make sense. 3) They appeared to be extremely short staffed for a Saturday night. The restaurant didn’t appear to be at full capacity, but maybe 80% yet they lacked the attentiveness that would have made it a more bearable experience. Our original waitress seemed to disappear mid service and we never saw her again. The young lady at the hostess stand ended up being our server for the rest of the evening. Needless to say, we won’t be returning or recommending...

Nothing negative can be said about Easton overall so it’s no surprise that La Bodega was fabulous. I’ll get to the food in a minute but wanted to mention that the restaurant décor is fun, whimsical and inviting, from the live cactus on every table to the neon cactus, the colorful bandana table napkins, the turntable and eclectic record selection and finally the troll cave.

As soon as you are seated, the server brings a plate with mini gluten free banana muffins for everyone at the table – a perfect brunch beginning! We had the amazingly fresh and authentic chicken empanadas, tacos (shrimp & mushroom), an egg/beans/avocado tostada, fried yucca, garlic tostones, and multiple tasty sauces to go with everything. Drinks included the Viva La Vida (watermelon margarita), the Spicy Tropical margarita which was perfectly spicy and not overly sweet, and my partner had the espresso martini with Mezcal that tasted as good as it looked. I’m still thinking about all the deliciousness and can’t wait...